Gav

http://rcdb.com/3613.htm?p=20263 Ok, so on the car itself look at the yellow triangle beside the right hand seats with two little wheels on the corners. Those wheels run against a rail in the station, forcing the triangle to stay level and therefore the car. http://rcdb.com/3613.htm?p=26387 Look at the station track, and you can see an orange rail (An I beam) that bends upwards and ends suddenly...This is the rail that is keeping that "triangle with wheels" level. Once it gets past the end of the rail the car is free to flip. http://rcdb.com/3676.htm?p=20078 Here is what happens when you get back to the station. You can see the rail 'curving" downwards to horizontal. This "guides" the triangle with wheels underneath the rail. Additionally, you can see a row of motors above it, and short little lever type arms that connect the rail to the motors. These allow the entire rail piece to move up and down, so it can push down on the triangle with wheels and force it to be level. Now, issues happen if a car comes in at 90 degrees. That rail that moves up and down can make the car the turn the other way...Instead of going level, it makes it go upside down even more. The system detects if it has done this, and the arm retracts quickly straight away, and then tries to push down again...It can take several attempts to level the car, wasting time and capacity. If someone can confirm, But in general with these rides, from how I understand it and from videos of the ride I have seen I thought it was policy there that the cars be evenly loaded, manufacturers instruction eg: http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=46996&start=110#wrap I know TPR got a really good ERT session at Grona Lund, but that's not how they normally run it right? The park probably wouldn't care about cars flipping too much and having the leveling issue coming into the station if it was ERT, but I don't think they would put up with it in day to day operations.....See http://www.lifthill.net/berichte/insane_eng.php Guest complaints/injuries would be the other aspect too IMO, since a cycle with a lot of flips exposes you to some pretty crazy forces..The blood noses and vomiting that happened at the Grona Lund session perhaps embodying that! So, my guess with SFMM is perhaps the ops weren't running it properly, and its more a case of SFMM actually moving in line with the way they should be doing it for safety and operational reasons. I don't think flips during the main ride itself are a problem, its more when cars come off the final 'turn' and do that thing where they flip a couple of extra times in the station and stop sideways, and then that leads to the system not leveling them properly and so on.

The thing that I find kinda silly is that the whole premise of the ride is that non-wizards ("muggles") are being let into to Hogwarts for the first time ever, so surely that should be a green light for Universal to basically tell the story in a manner that ensures the uninitiated "get it". Treat all guests as if they are outsiders basically, and that would help it reach out to more people. I mean, in the queue they have done some details that if you took in religiously and memorised would help the story make sense. For instance, in the defence against the dark arts classroom there is writing on the blackboard that explains that "Expecto Patronus" is the spell that should be used against Dementors. Problem is, I doubt someone unfamilar with HP would notice that, let alone recall it in that scene in the ride. The jumps between scenes in the ride itself are a bit problematic too. How did we go from being in the wooden bridge to being in the Forbidden Forest? How did we go from being in the Quiddich Pitch to in the Chamber of Secrets? Kinda seems they really wanted to include everything and rely upon guests to fill in the blanks. On the merchandise and Food and Bev side of things I think the way they have approached it is probably fine, because I doubt non fans are going to buy much merch anyway, so might as well go for authenticity. The food options too I think are appealing enough for anyone, fan or not. When you ride their latest, Transformers at least with the dialogue they keep it simple enough, and, when the opportunity arises EVAC provides convenient commentary for those who don't really know the characters, eg at the start: "I'ts Ravage! He's after the Allspark, we gotta catch him!"...Works well and lets all guests know exactly what is going on.

Couldn't see why not. It''d be a bit like visiting Strickers Grove on the one or two days per year they are open to the public. What would you call such an event...Blue Flash Bash?

I've never ridden the coasters in question, but to me, counting Blue Flash/Blue Too is more of a 'badge of honour' type thing rather than padding your count, and I reckon the fact Noxegon got it as his 1500th cred speaks to that. It's sort of in the same mindset to managing to get some other really out of the way cred, or getting all the creds in a particular "set" of coasters. Re being "well made", I guess what I'd interpret that as is that there is some design intent behind it....actually setting out to make a roller coaster that bears most of the characteristics/"systems" of one in a park, rather than a skateboard running down some plastic piping and having the track end and the skateboard rolling onto the lawn as the braking system.

I'm not sure if I'm 100% sold on this. I get that it's as if they are testing the car in a digital environment, but at the same time I kinda liked the realistic environment of the current version with traffic cones to dodge and so forth....Coupled with being in an actual car, that sort of set the ride apart, and made it 'real' compared to the number of other rides out there that deliberatley convey you through a fantasy environment. As was posted earlier, I keep imagining this all being blacklight type stuff.

Oh! LOL! That would almost make sense! Singapore people are VERY respectful of their surroundings, for example, in the queue for the ride, all of the stuff you see either behind fencing or out of reach in the American version, you can actually touch and reach in the Singapore queue. But it's because the people in that country respect that kind of stuff, and aren't disgusting animals that would purposely destroy it for no reason. So I can see the fine line of someone pressing the buttons (that are actually meant to be pressed) and getting shouted at by a Singapore local thinking they were disrespecting the display. It's actually kind of funny, when you think about it...and says a lot for our American society. Case in point.... Yeah lol indeed it was just another guest that told me off (Which makes it even funnier thinking back) not cast. The fact that bit of theming is behind a fence was one of the first things I noticed too, from the TRs, but didn't want to start a debate on the civility of the US v SG....3rd party observer here

On the SG version some woman told me off when I started playing with the one right where the SRQ enters the loading station...."Don't do that!".

Here's one I did at Movie World....Forever alone. Involved arriving at the park first thing and getting a boat to myself.

Out of interest, who is the manufacturer of those horse monorails anyway?

They make a 6 person cloverleaf, or an 8 person dinghy. The model seen at IAPPA suggests you can use either on the hydromagnetic mammoth, but guessing Holiday World went with the dinghy due to the higher capacity.

I rode this yesterday. In all honesty, it's more comfortable than Battlestar, because the shoulder straps simply don't neck cut. It still tracks like a regular Vekoma, but without the headbanging its a pretty cool ride.....I've got no issue with some roughness if there is no headbanging.

Haven't heard a variant of that joke before.

So what exactly is it that makes this Corral "OK" ?

Since your visit they have disassembled the slides and replaced some segments, and now the slide runs with a policy that you have to wear a rashie (the park provides them if you dont have one)

2nd last pic is Waterfront station on the Sentosa express monorail...was there a couple of days ago, so either getting off at Imbibah or Beach Station Last pic is perhaps one looking down from the chairlift that goes to the top of the Sentosa luge.

Less Cheese? How is that possible in something with a) Brendan Fraiser and b) anything related to the Mummy franchise? I think the Mummy at USF is one of my favorite rides , whats really different between the two? Simple... They took out Brendan Fraiser! This version is actually fully Egyptian themed, and not a bizzare "it's a movie set, but this whole place is a trap" deal. Basically, the story centers around finding the book of the living, to defeat Imhotep. Same effects, but different dialogue. The scene with the poor guy at the mercy of Imhotep has him begging for you to find the book to defeat him. The false unload scene was changed substantially. Instead of a booth with breaking glass, it's another Imhotep animatronic, and he is holding the book saying "without this book you'll never defeat me, death is only the beginning!" From there it plays out as normal, with the roof of fire and drop into the red fog. Just before the unload there's no more "where's my coffee?". Instead there is a mummy coffin. Imhotep is trapped inside, enraged, saying "you think this wooden prison can contain me?" Overall the story was less cheesy, and they did the lighting better on the coaster part, so the cardboard cutouts look less like cutouts. On the flip side, I felt the animatronics were less fluid and more jerky compared to the FL version.

Just rode the Singapore version today. Flawless basically, it just keeps the blowtorch on the whole way through and never lets up. You guys in SoCal and beyond are in for a treat.... Spoilers So the ride does indeed take place across two levels. About the 3rd screen in, is a half cylinder shape that's 2 stories high. You come sideways onto a lift, and the projectors sit on the same lift platform, above and behind the car. So it's just a case of everything moving together. You then move sideways off the lift the way you came. But the coolest bit, is that when you fall off a skyscraper (yeah yeah I know, but that trick was too good not to reuse) This bit is happening on the lift back down. Now, it's not a freefall, but it does move pretty quick, improving the sensation. Both the up and the down lifts are paired up in mirror image, so if you are in the front and look over the side you can see the other lift platform going the other way. All the footage is crystal clear and you always have a sense of where you are. The 'in between' real life sets are well done and have their own nice details. For instance a missile gets launched at you, explodes behind, and when the vehicle spins you see a giant hole in the concrete that you pass through, but the bits of rebar exposed from the blast are glowing red at the end but fade as they cool off....very realistic. Other highlights included the very good sound system, which made stuff like machine gun fire on the side of your vehicle, and the non stop suprises, like seeing a decepticon get hit by a subway train. I'll be clear now, Im not some Transformers foamer or anything, only seen the 1st of the recent trilogy....But this ride is just so well put together it deserves the praise. I felt it had a bit more polish and coherence than potter... On potter some of the stuff like sightlines being spoiled and being able to see stuff happen to the bench ahead did bug me a bit...not that I didn't love that ride and the ambitiousness of the kuka system. Anyway, Transformers FTW Ps...I will pick out one fault with Transformers... They used the same ride vehicle as spidey, but just with a wrap like the new test track cars.... So the tyres etc of the EVAC vehicle/autobot are just 2D on the side. Ah well, can't win em all.

^This. My thoughts exactly. My thoughts is that perhaps there might be a 6 person 'design bay 'or similar, and each person is tasked with designing on part of the car. One person picks tyres, another one colour, headlight design, propulsion source etc etc. So it could end up being a 'design by committee' perhaps?

I'm loving that interlocked Cobra Roll and Batwing Element, all kinda orbiting around each other. The best part is that its gonna face in towards the central part of X Sector, so it will be a great focal point.

Indeed they are. I got on the ride during a soft opening last Saturday. I found them to be far superior to other lap bar coasters I have ridden, including Maurers version. It is just really ergonomic and holds you comfortably, so the two inversions and drop are no problem at all. Only real issue I had was that the onboard audio was too quiet, so it was difficult to hear at times, especially on the lift. I thought it was a cool idea, but the secondary seatbelt is retractable, and the main harness physically wont pull down until you have done up your seatbelt. This greatly simplifes operations...People wont mess up and not fasten their seatbelt, nor do ops have to check both separately. Overall, a pretty good ride. Not that intense, but a lot of fun. It's just a shame the height limit is 140cm, since that would prevent many kids riding that would otherwise enjoy it.

X-Cars I think are a different case, because the vertical lifts on them have you on your back, so the backrest supports your body the whole time. With GIBs, isn't that initial reverse lift out of the station problematic, not the 2nd one? Of course, a maurer type harness could hold your in, but your whole upper body would flop foward the entire time. I think the only viable non OTSR solution is a vest style restraint. Lap bar alone wont cut it. On an unrelated note...If the coaster were smooth, then normal OTSRs should be fine, no matter what the manufacturer right?

^But this is the first of its type ever built, so no other parks have one.

To claify though. WDW is the name given to the whole Resort. Hollywood Studios, Epcot, Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom are the parks within it. It's just a launched coaster in the Dark. Very smooth ride. Ever been on Superman at Movie World?...Its like that, but with a less powerful launch. I'm guessing by your avatar you've been on Demon at Wonderland. Rock n Roller Coaster has 3 inversions too. Dont miss out on Islands of Adventure though! it's a great all around park, with stuff like The Amazing Adventures of Spiderman, Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey, Jurrasic park and the Incredible Hulk Coaster. Universal studios is good too, and can be done on a multi park ticket. The thing to keep in mind is that if you're sinking close to $2000 on airfares, then an extra say $40 to upgrade your pass to include an extra park is totally worth it. If you're after cheap Accom, well, when I've been traveling I have been solo too, and just stayed at the Hotel 6 on American Way (At the top of International Drive) It's walking distance to the Universal parks, and you can take the Lynx buses to Sea World, and connect from Sea World down to Walt Disney World.

For $3 Mil, how much height, length and speed do you get? Seems like great value for money, and could well turn out to be the 'SLC of wooden coasters', with respect to the number built.

Giant Drop at Dreamworld tends to suffer capacity issues...I kind of wonder if it would be possible to make the drop car more akin to this: http://www.zamperla.com/en/product/103/sky-drop.html?category_id=8 Obviously the cantilevered seats would need to be pretty strong, but its a means of getting around only being able to use the sides of the tower.